Kentucky survives and advances in NCAA opener against NKU

Kentucky built and then frittered away most of a double-digit lead inside the first 11 minutes.

This inspired Coach John Calipari to walk a few steps onto the court and bellow, “Throw it to Bam!!!!”

UK presumably pays Calipari handsomely to dispense such sound coaching advice. Bam Adebayo’s domination propelled Kentucky to a fast start. Not so coincidentally, he did not see the ball much for several minutes and Northern Kentucky rallied.

After Calipari’s high-volume advice, Adebayo only touched the ball twice in the next nine possessions. A foul call nullified the first touch. The second was a bullet pass from Malik Monk that probably was supposed to be a lob.

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No, Kentucky’s 79-70 victory over Northern Kentucky to open the NCAA Tournament was not picture perfect. “It was not the prettiest win,” Isaiah Briscoe conceded.

With its many freshmen playing for the first time in survive-and-advance conditions, a seamless performance seemed improbable. But an uneven performance coming after the good vibes at the Southeastern Conference Tournament surely sent a sobering message to the Big Blue Nation.

Even with a return to the inconsistent, erratic play that marked the regular season, Kentucky advanced to Sunday’s second-round of the South Region. The Cats (30-5) will play Wichita State, which outlasted Dayton 64-58 earlier Friday night.

As Northern Coach John Brannen said of UK on Thursday, “Three top-15 draft picks. They’ve got a Hall of Fame coach. I could go on and on about what keeps you up at night.”

UK took the lead for good inside the first three minutes and cruised to a 38-24 halftime lead.

But the cruise was bumpy. UK forgot to the get the ball to Adebayo and took some ill-advised shots (a 12-foot floater by Wenyen Gabriel was a head-scratcher).

But Kentucky was clearly the better team, as evidenced by NKU’s 9-for-37 shooting in the first half.

“What I said at halftime (was) the one thing I’m worried about is they missed a bunch of threes that they normally make,” Calipari said of Northern’s 3-for-17 shooting from beyond the arc in the first half. “Or the game would have been closer. And then late in the game, they made them all.”

In a reprise of another regular-season bugaboo, Northern shot much better in the second half (47.2 percent) than in the first (24.3 percent).